Fig. 1015. Fig. 1016.
Arabic coin called Kufic, coined in 903 in Samarcand.—Götland. Real size.
Fig. 1017. Fig. 1018.
Kufic coin of silver, date 742–743. Real size. Found in the cemetery of Fredrikshald, Sweden, where another Kufic coin and two silver bracelets had previously been found.
As in the Greek, Roman, and earlier Byzantine periods, so in the Viking age, the island of Gotland stands foremost as the commercial centre of the North, as is proved by the number of coins discovered, showing that she kept the supremacy of trade for some ten or twelve centuries. The numerous English coins found there and in Sweden, show that the Swedes, and the people inhabiting the islands of the Baltic, were a seafaring people, and were constantly engaged in trading and warlike expeditions to England; in a word, they must have formed a great part of the host that made warfare in Western Europe. The runic stones which have been raised to the memory of those who have died in foreign lands are found almost if not entirely in Sweden.
Norway has produced fewer coins than the other Scandinavian countries, but this may be owing to their having been melted, as jewels of silver are far more common there than elsewhere.
Fig. 1019.—Silver cup.—Götland. ½ real size.
Fig. 1020.—Silver vase.—Götland. ⅔ real size.
After the Roman and Byzantine era the Arabic period begins. Trade still followed the ancient channel through the present Russia. Thousands of Arabic coins of silver, besides probably, silver ornaments, to which the name of Kufic[[172]] has been given, struck in the countries ruled by the Arabians, found their way north from Bokhara, Samarcand, Bagdad, Kufa, &c., &c., the earliest dating from 698, the latest 1010 after the Christian era. Coins of gold are exceedingly rare; the greater number of these belong to the ninth and the first half of the tenth century, that is to say, between 880 and 955. From that time a great number of silver ornaments appear in the North.